Christmas Dolls at Figureworks

Randall Harris, Director of the Figureworks Gallery in Williamsburg Brooklyn, has used a personal Christmas memory as an invitation to stretch the creativity of more than 50 artists.

In the mid-1960s, Harris’ sister Jane received a much-wanted doll for Christmas.  It was the perfect gift to steal the heart of a 10-year-old girl.  However, a short while later, her less-privileged cousins came over, and Jane and Randall’s father, feeling charitable towards the cousin, made Jane give her new doll away.

Cue Christmas Calamity: Mrs. Harris was livid, Jane was heartbroken, and Randall ran upstairs to make a replacement doll from an old toilet paper roll.  The incident passed into family legend – and Randall’s father, still alive and well-into his 80s, still has not lived it down.

But it did more than that.  It also began a tradition where every year Randall created a hand-made doll for Jane every Christmas. 

Harris decided to honor that tradition by enlisting 50 artists to create a doll for a special exhibition, with Jane acting as "guest judge.”  She judged the creations of local artists, and would take home the winning doll.

Your correspondent attended the grand opening reception at Figureworks last week, and was on hand when Jane Harris selected artist Clarissa Crabtree.

It was a particular pleasure to see the work of celebrated arts advocate Clarissa Crabtree win the award; she has been mentioned in these pages previously as a champion of Gotham’s cultural initiatives, lending her industry, savvy and business acumen.  Now making her debut as an artist herself with a doll that is both kinky and sweet.  With its mop of wild green hair and homespun gingham dress, the doll looks sweetly and serenely on, a mix of East Village and rural Kansas.  The fingers are elegantly articulated, and the simple but expressive face brand it a delicious piece of urban folk art.

The other dolls in competition are inventive, as well.  One, taking the directive of art and doll literally, combined both by embedding a doll within the picture canvas.  Another droll work was the doll opening a box to find … another doll.

Also on hand was a wonderful photo of a discarded mattress on the street (not an unusual image in New York), elongated with pink material and tape to form a doll lying beside it.  All the works are for sale – except that of the winner, who, oddly, is the only one who cannot sell her work.

This exhibition, compact and fun, is on hand through December 21. 

A quick word about Figureworks, which showcases 20^th century fine art that explores the human form. Established artists drawing inspiration from the human figure are represented, and Figureworks handles a diverse selection of figurative art incorporating the male and female nude, portraiture and narratives. Figureworks opened in 2000 and is located 168 North 6th St. (1 block from Bedford Avenue “L” train); Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NY 11211.  Hours are Saturday and Sunday from 1:00-6:00 PM, and the Web site is: www.figureworks.com. 

With Christmas nigh, what better way to start the season than with a trip to Brooklyn to see some interesting, emerging artists create holiday dolls?

Jean Paul Gaultier at the Brooklyn Museum of Art

Today, we get a dispatch from the trenches by Arts Advocate Clarissa Crabtree.  For nearly 30 years, Ms. Crabtree has been an indefatigable patron of the arts, working tirelessly on behalf of such disparate causes as affordable, classic theater to museum preservation.  She recently attended the much-ballyhooed Jean Paul Gaultier show at the Brooklyn Museum, and offers her thoughts below.

As a woman of a ‘certain age’ I may not be the most appropriate person to review the current Jean Paul Gaultier exhibit From the Catwalk to the Cakewalk at the Brooklyn Museum of Art.  As someone who doesn’t get the fashion statements made by ripped jeans, micro-minis that leave nothing to the imagination and pants hanging so low that the wearer has trouble walking,  I am hard-pressed to find anything of value in this retrospective.  That the man is a good illustrator cannot be denied, his design sketches are quite lovely and although he is prolific, he is not very original.  One room is full of black leather and shiny plastic S & M gear for both men and women, there are riffs on plaids and kilts, non-kilt man-skirts  and the almost mandatory ethnic influences,  on corsets, bustiers and panniers (all originally undergarments now worn on the outside) and of course Madonna’s (in)famous cone bra ensemble for her 1990 Blond Ambition Tour as well as costumes for her 2006 Confessions Tour.  He has also designed for Australian singer Kyle Minogue, as well as for numerous films. To be fair, there are flashes of whimsy – my favorite dress was  a rather non-descript white ball gown -- but when the hem was lifted as if one were about to dance the can-can, the entire underskirt had high-kicking legs printed on the fabric.  Perhaps the most amusing aspect of the exhibit was that the mannequins appeared alive.  By projecting filmed faces on them some talked about the outfit they were wearing, some sang or provided  sound effects, and several flirted with the crowd.

Jean Paul Gaultier (born 1952) is a French haute couture and Pret-a-Porter fashion designer with no formal training who presented his first collection in the mid-70s and has long been considered the enfant terrible of French fashion – this show will not diminish that reputation. He has worked for Pierre Cardin and Jean Patou, he launched his haute couture line in 1997 and was the creative director of Hermès from 2003 to 2010;.  As with all things French, there are very strict rules about  what can and cannot call itself haute couture and it is protected by law and regulated by Chambre de commerce et d'industrie de Paris. The bedrock of Haute couture is fashion that is constructed by hand (without the use of sewing machines and sergers/overlockers) from start to finish, made from high quality, expensive, and often unusual fabric and sewn with extreme attention to detail and finished by the most experienced and capable seamstresses, often using time-consuming, hand-executed techniques.  It is generally this exquisite attention to craftsmanship and detail that makes an haute couture garment special and swoon-worthy. To think that these highly trained and skilled seamstresses wasted their time, energy and talent to produce garments that almost no one would ever wear appalls me.

This exhibit also raises a bigger issue that has generated debate in the art world for some time now.  As someone with a modicum of social conscience it galls me Gaultier can make a living producing what he does, but then to be additionally rewarded and have the work validated with a museum retrospective begs the question  is it art? Museums, in an effort to attract younger audiences and meet their bottom line, have for several years been playing on the edge of this issue – just because it is cool, hip or whatnot, does not mean it is worthy of being shown in a fine art museum.  The Art of the Motorcycle at the Guggenheim in 1998, the recent Chaos: Punk to Couture from the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art,  the Brooklyn’s previous exhibit on Star Wars and perhaps most famously the quilts from Gee’s Bend that not only were shown at the Whitney Museum in New York City but also at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the Indianapolis Museum of Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, among others are all examples that the fuel the debate.  I am not suggesting that any of these shows are not worthy to be seen in an appropriate venue but I question if museums, in their rush to bring in paying customers, are not sacrificing their missions and reputations as centers of vigorous scholarship and keepers of our collective heritage. 

Angelica Kauffman, Self Portrait, 1787

I was recently taken to task by New York arts advocate Clarissa Crabtree for the lack of women artists covered in The Jade Sphinx.  The simple – and lamentable – fact is that women, by and large, were not accorded opportunities to pursue artistic careers until the Modern Age.  There were exceptions, of course, and among them was Swiss-Austrian Neoclassical painter Angelica Kauffman.

Kauffman (1741 – 1807) was born in Switzerland, but grew up in Austria where her family originated; her father, Joseph Johann Kauffman, was a painter.  He taught her the fundamentals of drawing and painting, while her mother taught young Angelica several languages.  She also was a skilled musician, and the young woman was torn between which art was to be her master. 

However, her precocity in painting was immense, and Angelica was selling work and professionally painting portraits while still an adolescent.  When only 13 years old, Angelica went with her father to Milan, Rome, Bologna and Venice where, like the young Mozart and his music, she was displayed as a prodigy with the brush.  She spoke French, English and Italian (as well as German) and this facility with language allowed her to make a lucrative living painting portraits of visitors to Rome. 

She was introduced to Lady Wentworth, an English aristocrat, while in Venice, and returned with her to the UK.  There she painted the portrait of celebrated actor David Garrick (1771-1779) and became something of a society painter.  She also befriended painter Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792), and worked with him to create the Royal Academy.  She was only one of two women (the other being Mary Moser, 1744-1819) to have R. A. after her name – however, her friendship with Reynolds and membership in the RA was not without dissent.  Painter Nathaniel Hone included a nude caricature of Kauffman in his satirical 1775 painting The Conjurer – but later painted it out.  The picture was not accepted by the Academy.

Kauffman was an annual exhibitor with the Royal Academy from 1769 until 1782, and in 1773 she was appointed by the Academy with others to decorate St Paul's Cathedral.  The work would never be completed. 

Upon the death of Kauffman’s first husband (they were separated – almost as much of a scandal as a lady painter!), she married Antonio Zucchi (1728–1795), a Venetian artist then living in the UK.  She became part of the social and artistic scene of Venice, and continued to contribute to the Royal Academy until 1797.  When she died in Rome in 1807, the entire Academy of St Luke followed her body to her tomb in Sant'Andrea delle Fratte, carrying two of her best pictures in the parade.

Today we look at Kauffman’s self-portrait from 1787.  It is a stunning work.  Kauffman does not paint herself as a society lady or a great beauty (though she is quite lovely), but, rather, as a working artist, complete with portfolio and drawing implement.  Her identification with her craft is clear.
 

Notice the exquisite handling of the images on the highly-cinched belt, which includes classical figures and clearly indicates her Italian sympathies.  Moreover, the landscape over her shoulder is clearly that of Italy, rather than England, Switzerland or Austria. 

She uses a great deal of transparent white to create the gauzy quality of her gown, and she depicts her oddly masculine hands with a deft touch.  Her hair is plaited atop her head and adorned with a simple ribbon.

One of the more interesting questions is – how did she do this picture?  In most self-portraits, the artist is looking at the viewer, mainly because the artist was – at the time – looking at a mirror.  But here, Kauffman has turned to the side – a remarkable act of virtuosity.

More Kauffman tomorrow.

Orange Pulp: The Pulp Magazine and Contemporary Culture

Proving once again that great things often come in small packages, my New York readers could do no better than a visit to the Palitz Gallery at Lubin House, 11 East 61^st Street.  In this small space, Syracuse University Library has managed to cram 61 super-rare works from the long-ago world of pulp magazines – treasures much too fun to miss.  I attended last night with arts advocate Clarissa Crabtree, and the show is sure to please anyone with even a passing interest in Americana or classic pop culture.

A quick primer for the uninitiated: the pulp magazine was so-named because of the rough, wood-pulp paper on which they were printed.  As such, pulps were not supposed to last – they were the essence of disposable literature.  But many, many American pop culture icons emerged from the pulps, including such characters as Doc Savage, The Shadow, Conan the Barbarian, Sam Spade and Tarzan of the Apes.  Writers who worked in the pulps included Ray Bradbury, Dashiell Hammett, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Isaac Asimov, and even world-class crackpot and religious huckster, L. Ron Hubbard.

The heyday of the pulps was roughly from the start of World War I to the end of the 1940s.  They were largely genre-specific, and to walk into a newsstand in the 1930s was to walk into a paradise catering to every taste.  There were magazines devoted to science fiction or supernatural stories, or detective stories, jungle stories, adventure stories, hero pulps and aviation stories.  There even was a short-lived pulp dedicated to stories about airships! 

One of the greatest things about the pulps was the vibrant cover art, well represented in this exhibit.  Several paintings by Norman Saunders are on hand, and they have to be seen to be believed.  Artists worked at breakneck speed, and most of the work created for the pulps no longer exists.  But it is not scarcity alone that makes this exhibit worthwhile -- the pulps were often lurid, but they were lurid to an almost lyrical degree, and much of the work (both art and prose) attains a status of near-poetry.

Also on hand: rare letters from a young writer named Ray Bradbury, still trying to break into the business; a table devoted to The Shadow (the greatest creation of the pulps), including rare radio scripts, advertising posters, the first issue of the magazine, and an Orson Welles radio show playing on a continuous loop; a payment stub for H.P. Lovecraft for his story At the Mountain of Madness, naming Julie Schwartz (of later comic book fame) as his agent; and a copy of Weird Tales containing the first published fiction of Tennessee Williams.

This exhibit runs through April 12, and gallery hours are Monday to Friday 10 a.m. - 6:00 p.m. and Saturday 11 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.  Admission is free.